my hold and appropriate to herself! Instead of these
pleasant rooms, where should I be lodged? In a dingy den looking on
a backyard excluded from the sun by day and vocal with cats by night;
while Mrs. Mivers luxuriated in two drawing-rooms with southern aspect
and perhaps a boudoir. My brougham would be torn from my uses and
monopolized by 'the angel of my hearth,' clouded in her crinoline and
halved by her chignon. No! if ever I marry--and I never deprive myself
of the civilities and needlework which single ladies waste upon me by
saying I shall not marry--it will be when women have fully established
their rights; for then men may have a chance of vindicating their own.
Then if there are two drawing-rooms in the house I shall take one;
if not, we will toss up who shall have the back parlour; if we keep a
brougham, it will be exclusively mine three days in the week; if Mrs. M.
wants L200 a year for her wardrobe she must be contented with one, the
other half will belong to my personal decoration; if I am oppressed by
proof-sheets and printers' devils, half of the oppression falls to her
lot, while I take my holiday on the croquet ground at Wimbledon. Yes,
when the present wrongs of women are exchanged for equality with men, I
will cheerfully marry; and to do the thing generous, I will not oppose
Mrs. M.'s voting in the vestry or for Parliament. I will give her my own
votes with pleasure."

"I fear, my dear cousin, that you have infected Kenelm with your selfish
ideas on the nuptial state. He does not seem inclined to marry,--eh?"

"Not that I know of."

"What sort of girl is Cecilia Travers?"

"One of those superior girls who are not likely to tower into that
terrible giantess called a 'superior woman.' A handsome, well-educated,
sensible young lady, not spoiled by being an heiress; in fine, just the
sort of girl whom you could desire to fix on for a daughter-in-law."

"And you don't think Kenelm has a fancy for her?"

"Honestly speaking, I do not."

"Any counter-attraction? There are some things in which sons do not
confide in their fathers. You have never heard that Kenelm has been a
little wild?"

"Wild he is, as the noble savage who ran in the woods," said Cousin
Mivers.

"You frighten me!"

"Before the noble savage ran across the squaws, and was wise enough to
run away from them. Kenelm has run away now somewhere."

"Yes, he does not tell me where, nor do they know at his lodgings.
A heap of notes on